Plenty of unemployable PhDs here Australia. I know one who is tutoring high school students to earn a living. His thesis was on phycology and the production of sustainable fuels. A nuclear physicist with a PhD is unemployable and is retraining as a data scientist. Another phycologist is retraining as a counsellor. A molecular biologist is running a plant shop. The first phycologist is charming but a century ago, he w…
Personally I wouldn't have posted this. It has tones which can only be hurtful, to somebody you presumably know.
more pointedly: the commenter presumes that the friends are unhappy with their lives. Also that some them would be better served performing back-breaking menial low-wage labor while otherwise being illiterate. Any PhD (even one in specializing in Plankton and especially nuclear physics/engineering) would equip you with a bunch transferable skills that normally would be valued in a modern society ... 1) public speaking 2) initiative 3) resourcefulness 4) analysis and communication etc etc. If I was being uncharitable I would say finance and law are actually worse for society: at least the subset of those that get paid the highest with respect to their impact on the broader society (but that is debatable).